Author: Ashleigh Macro

Author: Discover seven of the best Mac and PC applications for digital painting, including Corel Painter, ArtRage, Rebelle and more

We've talked lots about our favourite mobile apps for artists and designers that like to work on the move, but here we're taking a look at our favourite Mac and PC painting software for artists, as used by professionals. There are lots of software options out there, but which are the best for digital painting? Here are six of our favourite painting applications for artists.

Best painting software: Adobe Photoshop

Let's start with one you've probably all heard of and that's Adobe Photoshop. Creatives from a huge number of different disciplines, including artists looking to paint on a digital canvas, use Photoshop to help them achieve great results.

With Photoshop, you'll get access to thousands of brushes that you can add to by downloading more or creating your own, and it's constantly being updated thanks to Adobe's Creative Cloud subscription model.

The company is set to host its Adobe Max conference next week to introduce new tools and improvements that could benefit artists.

One downfall of Photoshop for digital painting is its lack of texture and realism – it's tricky to make your work look as though it was created using traditional paints and canvas (although there are plugins available that'll help, as we discuss later in this article). Read on to find out about some more natural media painting software used by professional artists.

Step 1

We've talked lots about our favourite mobile apps for artists and designers that like to work on the move, but here we're taking a look at our favourite Mac and PC painting software for artists, as used by professionals. There are lots of software options out there, but which are the best for digital painting? Here are six of our favourite painting applications for artists.

Best painting software: Adobe Photoshop

Let's start with one you've probably all heard of and that's Adobe Photoshop. Creatives from a huge number of different disciplines, including artists looking to paint on a digital canvas, use Photoshop to help them achieve great results.

With Photoshop, you'll get access to thousands of brushes that you can add to by downloading more or creating your own, and it's constantly being updated thanks to Adobe's Creative Cloud subscription model.

The company is set to host its Adobe Max conference next week to introduce new tools and improvements that could benefit artists.

One downfall of Photoshop for digital painting is its lack of texture and realism – it's tricky to make your work look as though it was created using traditional paints and canvas (although there are plugins available that'll help, as we discuss later in this article). Read on to find out about some more natural media painting software used by professional artists.

Step 2

Corel has just released the all-new Corel Painter 2016, and we love it. We've given the upgrade a Digital Arts Editor's Choice Award and a 4.5/5 star rating.

You can find out all of the details about Corel Painter 2016 in our review, but to give you a quick overview you'll find the option to rotate paper texture and flow maps, Dynamic Sprinkles for even better natural media brushstrokes, Audio Expression and context-aware hints and visual tooltips to help you master all of the application's tools. You can also import Adobe Photoshop brushes for the first time.

Corel Painter 16 is available for Mac or Windows for £314.95 incl VAT from Corel's website, or for £159 as an upgrade from Painter 7 or up.

Step 3

If you like the sound of Corel Painter's natural brushes but are already a Photoshop user, you might be interested in Corel's ParticleShop plugin. You'll get 11 brushes included, all of which are fluid and change depending on pressure and movement.

If you love the brushes included in the ParticleShop plugin, there are loads of additional brush packs for anything from dust and debris, fabric, flames, fur, hair, smoke, storms and more.

ParticleShop is available for £39.95 from Corel's website, as are the additional brushes packs that cost £24.95 each.

Step 4

ArtRage is another great piece of painting software for artists working on a Mac or PC (it's also available for iPhone, iPad and Android). It offers brilliantly realistic tools and canvases and is one of the most natural-looking painting applications around.

Where it shines brightest is in its mixing and smearing, particularly when it comes to acrylics, as the textures and shadows created will make you doubt that they're digital.

As well as acrylics, ArtRage also offers chalk, oil paints, watercolours, inking pens and more.

Step 5

If you love painting with watercolours then it's tricky to beat the natural, realistic look of watercolour painting within Rebelle. It's not lacking when it comes to other tools, either. We'd argue that it doesn't do acrylics quite as well as ArtRage, but the effects are far from poor and you'll also get good pastel, pencil, ink pen, marker and airbrush.

Rebelle is available for Mac or Windows for $59.99 from Escape Motions, and there's a free demo available if you'd prefer to try before you buy.

Step 6

As the name hints, Autodesk's Sketchbook Pro is designed with sketching in mind, but that doesn't mean it's not a good painting tool too. It's not quite as natural or realistic as some of the other software mentioned here, but you will get lots of choice and customisation options when it comes to brushes and a nice, easy to use interface. Sketchbook Pro is more ideal for the less traditional painters, perhaps comic book or character artists.

SketchBook Pro is available to try for free, after which it'll cost you $2.99 per month or $24.99 per year from the dedicated website.